[SCCC] CQWW CW CW5W(N5ZO) SOSB10 HP

[marko.n5zo at gmail.com]

CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW - 2025

Call: CW5W
Operator(s): N5ZO
Station: CX6VM

Class: SOSB10 HP
QTH: Uruguay
Operating Time (hrs): 41+

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Zones  Countries
------------------------------
  160:                    
   80:                    
   40:                    
   20:                    
   15:                    
   10: 4113    40      132
------------------------------
Total: 4113    40      132  Total Score = 2,084,124

Club: Southern California Contest Club

Comments:

After completing 40 zones in SSB portion from Peru (OA4O) my XYL and I had already planned to spend couple weeks in Brazil and Uruguay around November CW contest, including return contest operation from Jorge’s CX6VM excellent station in Northern Uruguay where I had already operated in 2023 CW contest. 
Plan was to either try again for possible world record on 10 meters single band or do all band effort which was not possible in 2023.  I got to station by crossing land-border from Brazil on Tuesday before the contest and as station has had little use in past year we immediately started to review equipment and any potential problems with 3 rotators.  We had an issue with possible open pot wire on one of the rotators but fortunately Jeff W2FU from Green Heron was able to guide us to use workaround and we got that one figured out and top 40 meter and 10 m antenna rotator was secured at 60 m tall big tower.  However we soon found another problem at same tower, and 40 m stack box at 40 m elevation was probably fried by previous lightning strike as we could not get any of the 3 40 m yagis on that tower to work and so there wasn’t working 40 m antenna available at the station.  QTH is very windy and I did not want to climb up on that unfamiliar tower without good safety gear which we did not have available. 
There was popular demand to do all band from CX and I was kind of psyched for it, but decision of the category was made for us and it was going to be SOSB 10 m again.  That was not a bad deal as CX can arguably be one of the best locations on planet for 10 m and we were still near sunspot maximum, so with some luck with propagation it might be possible to set new record.  Also, it was clear that quantity of available multipliers had somewhat recovered from 2023 when it was extremely low still due to reduced travel after pandemic.  There was some other damage with 10 meter antenna systems at the site which are:
3 stack of 5 els to USA, 3 stack of 5 els to Europe with top antenna rotating and 6 el monobander at top of 60 m tall tower (i.e. very high antenna).  Half of the middle antenna of US stack had fallen down to ground but it still had back 3 elements up there and feedline was still connected to it, so it was some kind of
3 element yagi.  During the days before the contest when I was switching different antennas I actually felt that the damaged now 3 element antenna seemed to be best of anything available when listening zone 7/8 stations, which actually may make some sense.  There was also periodic quite loud powerline noise from EU direction which I cannot remember at all from 2023.  EU stack points directly to last pole and transformer about 50 meters away where power is coming to the property.  Birds have several nests on that pole and it could definitely use some cleaning and inspection.  Sometimes when noise was bad with EU stack I ended up using 6 el yagi at tall tower for EU instead and pointing that antenna somewhat South of Europe so that I was reducing powerline noise from the pole.  That tower is bit on the side of the power pole, so it seemed to work better for my hearing but still not as well as EU stack did when powerline noise was not present. 
I set up the station as SO2V capable using 2 K3 radios that were on site and Acom commutator box I had brought with me.

There wasn’t really other serious competition I was aware of other than PY2YU operating from PX2W.  But based on what I saw from scoreboard Tom was planning to enter 10 m Assisted.  I was always planning to enter non-assisted this year as I wanted to try for record on that category.

As contest began, it was obvious that rates were bit slower than in 2023, however band was still open during the night and by 07z I had clawed back most of the QSOs and I was almost at same numbers as 2023 when I had QSOs for the record but missed on multipliers.  However, during that Saturday morning something strange happened as when propagation turns from LP to Europe to SP to Europe I just had loud noise coming from EU direction and there just wasn’t almost no stations at all on whole band.  This went on for couple hours and I had 1.5 hours without single QSO from 0753-0922z.  Sunrise at my QTH was around 0820z.  This blackout event pretty much killed any hopes for new record as by 11 z I was already around 400 Qs behind my 2023 effort.

Rest of the contest was more normal although with somewhat lower rates throughout than in 2023.  At the end I had 800 Qs less than 2023 but with 15 more multipliers.  The QSO difference seems to be more or less equally distributed with different geographies, less than 2023 to all major directions, EU, JA, US.  I took generous 5 hour nap on 2nd night, which may have been bit too much.  I was closely watching Tom at PX2W on scoreboard and tried to keep up with his total score.  At the end we have almost identical total score but I had almost 600 Qs more but 29 country multipliers less than him, which I think makes sense as difference between our non-assisted and assisted operations.  I clearly had better shot to Asia with my high 6 el.  I want to congratulate Tom for his great effort and good scoreboard race even when we were in different categories.
 Comparing 2023 pre-peak and 2025 post-peak contests I could feel solar cycle slipping away.  It will be interesting to see what will be left of this CW contesting activity when we have next peak about 10 years from now. 

But the coolest thing for me of this particular contest was working all 40
zones:
I have contested for about 45 years. I cannot remember ever working all 40 zones on any single band or been operator at any of the multi op stations where we would have got all 40 zones on band I was operating on. Over the years I then went to operate this contest myself from all 40 zones and completed that lifetime crazy “reverse WAZ” contesting goal last month in SSB contest from OA4O. Well, what happened next just a month later here at CW5W is that I actually finally worked all 40 zones now myself in “non-reverse”. I really did not expect it but one by one they all made it to log and of all zones it was zone #1 which was last one on Sunday evening as I worked 2 Alaskans and VY1.
What a contest, what a year, CQ contest delivered !

As everyone else, I was monitoring scoreboard and race of the top ten in SOAB.
Unbelievable as these guys basically made almost as many contacts on 10 m as I did with my single band effort + then they make another 1.5x Qs with other radio on other bands. That is superhuman stuff. Congrats to Dan, Chris, Braco, Andy, Filipe and others of great show and to Kevin making it interesting. 
Big thanks again to Jorge, CX6VM hosting me !  I’m staying bit longer here in Uruguay and plan to put CW5W back on air again in ARRL 10 m contest next weekend.
73 de Marko CX/N5ZO


Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/